Letter From South Africa: The Fight for What Mandela Promised

They are young, bold, and totally at war with the government Mandela founded

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In the four years my husband and I spent making a documentary in Durban, South Africa, Mazwi Nzimande stood out with the solemn face of a philosopher. Though just 17 years old -- and still working on filling out his moustache -- he was absolutely sure of one thing. "If Mandela could see how we are living, he would not be happy."

Mazwi's family lives under the threat of eviction. Men in red overalls carrying axes and chainsaws are sent by the government every day to destroy people's homes. Poor people are being pushed out of the cities, off the valuable land, and dumped in the dreaded "tins" -- vast transit camps far away. If this sounds a lot like the film District 9, that is because it is. The director, who is South African, simply substituted humans for cat-food loving aliens.

Back in 2007, when we first started filming, there was still the sense that if Mandela only knew about what was happening to South Africa, he would get angry and punish his underlings like a stern father. We kept asking the same question: What did Mandela know? How much was he allowed to know? Did he know about the evictions? Did he know about the apartheid-style laws being passed to justify the evictions? How about the fatal shooting of 34 striking miners in Marikana last year? The death this September of a girl the same age as Mazwi, shot twice in the back by police? Nqobile Nzuza's only crime was to attend a protest against local leaders who were evicting shack dwellers like her. People often ask me what it was like to grow up under apartheid. I'm tempted to dare them: "Visit South Africa today."

When I was ten years old, my mother came home from work in tears. "He's free. There's hope," she said. After serving 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela had been released. When I was fourteen, Mandela became South Africa's first democratically-elected president. I was too young to vote, but still, I felt part of this new country being built. My all-white school opened its doors to black, "colored" and Indian kids. There was a call for flag ideas — we all drew our designs and sent them in. We were given bound copies of the new Constitution. I still have mine, and my heart still flutters a little when I hold it. Democracy is a word I feel in my bones because I watched it being made, day by day.

This is the first day South Africa knows for certain that Mandela, devastatingly, does not know what's happening to the democracy he built. He cannot see that it is being dismantled, no less by his fellow struggle veterans like President Jacob Zuma. Mandela cannot see the millions Zuma continues to spend on renovations to his home while millions of poor people live in shacks without access to clean water, sanitation or electricity. He cannot see that those who dare to expose corrupt officials from the party Mandela founded are targeted -- just as Mandela was targeted for all those terrifying years -- by hit men. Mandela cannot see the hundreds of young people like Mazwi trying to finish the job he started, to give the poor proper housing and heal the scars still left by apartheid.

Bandile Mdlalose, a spunky 27-year-old activist in Abahlali baseMjondolo, South Africa's largest social movement of the poor, recently spent seven nights in prison. On the day she was released, I asked her how she was feeling. "You know, I had a lot of time to think in prison," she told me, "and I felt that I haven't done enough." She is now in hiding because hit men are threatening to kill her and her children. She's having trouble sleeping, but something — or someone — is refusing to allow her to retreat. "I know I might be killed. Before the bullet hits, I must know that I've given one hundred percent." Mandela would be proud.